صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

WEARINESS.

O LITTLE feet! that such long years
Must wander on through hopes and fears,
Must ache and bleed beneath your
load;

I, nearer to the wayside inn
Where toil shall cease and rest begin,

Am weary, thinking of your road!

O little hands! that, weak or strong,
Have still to serve or rule so long,

Have still so long to give or ask;
I, who so much with book and pen
Have toiled among my fellow-men,
Am weary, thinking of your task.

O little hearts! that throb and beat
With such impatient, feverish heat,

Such limitless and strong desires; Mine that so long has glowed ar burned,

With passions into ashes turned

Now covers and conceals its fires.

O little souls! as pure and white
And crystalline as rays of light

Direct from heaven, their source d
vine;

Refracted through the mist of years,
How red my setting sun appears,

How lurid looks this soul of mine!

FLIGHT THE THIRD.

FATA MORGANA.

O SWEET illusions of Song,

That tempt me everywhere,
In the lonely fields, and the throng
Of the crowded thoroughfare!

I approach, and ye vanish away,
I grasp you, and ye are gone;
But ever by night and by day,

The melody soundeth on.

As the weary traveller sees

In desert or prairie vast,
Blue lakes, overhung with trees,
That a pleasant shadow cast;
Fair towns with turrets high,

And shining roofs of gold,
That vanish as he draws nigh,
Like mists together rolled,

So I wander and wander along,
And forever before me gleams
The shining city of song,

In the beautiful land of dreams.

But when I would enter the gate

Of that golden atmosphere, It is gone, and I wander and wait For the vision to reappear.

THE HAUNTED CHAMBER. EACH heart has its haunted chamber, Where the silent moonlight falls!

On the floor are mysterious footsteps, There are whispers along the walls!

And mine at times is haunted

By phantoms of the Past,

As motionless as shadows

By the silent moonlight cast.

A form sits by the window,

That is not seen by day,

For as soon as the dawn approaches It vanishes away.

It sits there in the moonlight,

Itself as pale and still, And points with its airy finger Across the window-sill.

Without, before the window,
There stands a gloomy pine,
Whose boughs wave upward and down
ward

As wave these thoughts of mine.

And underneath its branches

Is the grave of a little child, Who died upon life's threshold, And never wept nor smiled.

What are ye, O pallid phantoms! That haunt my troubled brain? That vanish when day approaches, And at night return again?

[graphic][merged small]
[graphic]
[graphic]

"O LITTLE FEET! THAT SUCH LONG YEARS MUST WANDER ON."- Page 228.

« السابقةمتابعة »